First order of priority: where is all the "stuff" and how do I delete it? Take browsing history, for example. I know the URLs and Cookies are retained somewhere but where? And how do I delete them? Found it eventually -- open Chrome, go to Settings in the top right hand corner, choose Advanced, Privacy, and you'll see a label at the top saying Clear Browser Data. Glad that was simple!
So what about all the other junk. It's here I realise how different this architecture is from Windows. Windows provides a one-stop, integrated system for managing your files and folders, copying, deleting, uninstalling, etc. while Microsoft plug-ins like Office, Media Player, Explorer and the like seamlessly integrated into the OS (it's only buying third party games that things start to unravel!). Android appears to be more of a platform: if you want to do something specific, you'll need an app.
So its time to download a few free apps. First off was Clean Master which is supposed to get rid of junk in your various caches (this word, I am beginning to assume, means "history" or even "recycle bin"). Next, because I think I want a Windows-like Explorer, I downloaded Astro File manager. While I was on a roll I downloaded Moon+ Reader for my eBooks, MX Player for my video, and Wikipedia for Android ('cos it was there). Have to say: impressed with the ease and speed you can acquire this stuff.
However, since I'm not brave enough to actually upload any stuff from my PC yet (y'know -- music, films, eBooks, documents, that kind of thing) I still haven't a clue how they work. *Sigh*. Three days now. Am I having fun yet?
Friday, 28 June 2013
Thursday, 27 June 2013
Day 2: Getting started
Okay, time to stop being a wuss. I made a list: 16 things I want to do with my new tablet. Where to start? I Googled the N10 and found a site: 50 Great Tips & Tricks for the Nexus 10. Good a place to start as any. Item 1 -- upgrade Android. Think I did that by accident during my random perambulations earlier. Can't remember how, though. Item 2 -- Choose you screen orientation. Hmm, not sure I want to lock the screen yet. Dunno what I'm going to use it for predominantly. Activate Google Now. Okay, I remember seeing that when I set the machine up and disregarded it. What to do? Advice from the Net says "swipe upwards from the bottom centre screen". Okay, doing that but all I get is the Google search screen and the virtual keyboard. No icons to press at all. The Android forums all say there should be a menu with which to open reminder cards. Seems like a gimmick but, hey, I paid for it so I want it! After a hour of fruitlessly swiping, stabbing and otherwise performing arcane supernatural gestures on the screen I put the tablet away for the night. Aarrghh! Bloody useless machine!
It's now 0400 hours on day 2. Can't sleep. Can't let machine beat me! Must.get.out.of.bed.and.find.tablet. One hour later -- still trying to find a clue from the Android forums when, almost by accident, I find it. Swiping upwards gives me the usual search field and the keyboard. BUT, removing the keyboard shows an almost invisible three-dotted icon in the lower right corner. Aha! Clicking that restarts the Google Now process off again. So far: my upward-swiped Google Now has the search field, some prettier colours and two "cards" (one for the weather in Totton, England and one for my miserable shares investments. Never mind: I got there. Yay for me!).
The next advice is download the official Guidebook. I had found that last week during my OCD-driven search for buying criteria. I'd skimmed through it a few times but since I'd actually paid for the Nexus I figured I'd better have it for easy access on my new machine. Using Chrome I tapped on the .pdf header but, unlike similar actions on my trusty PC, nothing happened. Did this a few more times until I gave up. So, lying in bed (the sun is up now at 0400 hours and the birds are cheeping their dawn chorus -- damn! I never get up this early since I gave up working for a living), I query the ever-more-dependable Android forums. Like: where's all my stuff? Unlike the familiar Computer tag in Windows, there's no over-arching program for keeping track of your stuff without resorting to an app. To cut a long story short I found the Downloads app. And, yes, there were four iterations of Nexus-10-guidebook(1) & (2) & (3) & etc..pdf. Which brings me to the next question: How the flaming fuck do you delete anything from this device? It's only got 32 Gb of space for crying out loud. How do you get rid of the junk? (I'm getting the feeling that the catch phrase "there's an app for that" isn't going to be as cute as I first thought).
And on that thought, I decided to pass on #5 - "Download some tablet optimised apps". This is altogether one of the biggest jumps from the Microsoft PC concept, methinks, to the tablet genre. And I'm not too sure that Flash Player is a priority, either. I did, however, successfully "Expand my Keyboard" to the custom PC design. Oh God, some familiarity in a crazy universe. One more thing happened. Somehow I'd triggered an automatic upload of patches for the dozen or so apps I already have. I watched this happened with some bemusement and noticed a "swipeable" thingy in the top left hand corner of the screen. Notifications! Great. Something else to think about. It must be important to the "tablet experience" so I'd better keep an eye on it.
Enough for today. I've just discovered another problem. My Wi-Fi doesn't extend to my living room so any idea of a couch-potato-like existence with my new toy is doomed at birth unless I grasp some network hardware ideas. Is nothing simple?
It's now 0400 hours on day 2. Can't sleep. Can't let machine beat me! Must.get.out.of.bed.and.find.tablet. One hour later -- still trying to find a clue from the Android forums when, almost by accident, I find it. Swiping upwards gives me the usual search field and the keyboard. BUT, removing the keyboard shows an almost invisible three-dotted icon in the lower right corner. Aha! Clicking that restarts the Google Now process off again. So far: my upward-swiped Google Now has the search field, some prettier colours and two "cards" (one for the weather in Totton, England and one for my miserable shares investments. Never mind: I got there. Yay for me!).
The next advice is download the official Guidebook. I had found that last week during my OCD-driven search for buying criteria. I'd skimmed through it a few times but since I'd actually paid for the Nexus I figured I'd better have it for easy access on my new machine. Using Chrome I tapped on the .pdf header but, unlike similar actions on my trusty PC, nothing happened. Did this a few more times until I gave up. So, lying in bed (the sun is up now at 0400 hours and the birds are cheeping their dawn chorus -- damn! I never get up this early since I gave up working for a living), I query the ever-more-dependable Android forums. Like: where's all my stuff? Unlike the familiar Computer tag in Windows, there's no over-arching program for keeping track of your stuff without resorting to an app. To cut a long story short I found the Downloads app. And, yes, there were four iterations of Nexus-10-guidebook(1) & (2) & (3) & etc..pdf. Which brings me to the next question: How the flaming fuck do you delete anything from this device? It's only got 32 Gb of space for crying out loud. How do you get rid of the junk? (I'm getting the feeling that the catch phrase "there's an app for that" isn't going to be as cute as I first thought).
And on that thought, I decided to pass on #5 - "Download some tablet optimised apps". This is altogether one of the biggest jumps from the Microsoft PC concept, methinks, to the tablet genre. And I'm not too sure that Flash Player is a priority, either. I did, however, successfully "Expand my Keyboard" to the custom PC design. Oh God, some familiarity in a crazy universe. One more thing happened. Somehow I'd triggered an automatic upload of patches for the dozen or so apps I already have. I watched this happened with some bemusement and noticed a "swipeable" thingy in the top left hand corner of the screen. Notifications! Great. Something else to think about. It must be important to the "tablet experience" so I'd better keep an eye on it.
Enough for today. I've just discovered another problem. My Wi-Fi doesn't extend to my living room so any idea of a couch-potato-like existence with my new toy is doomed at birth unless I grasp some network hardware ideas. Is nothing simple?
Day 1: Opening the box
Having spent the preceding week like a 6-year-old suffering sleepless nights in anticipation of a new toy, I finally placed the order for my first tablet. OK, being a 58-year-old retired civil servant with copious amounts of OCD meant that I'd already trawled the Net looking for the device that met my usage criteria: once I'd worked out what that criteria would be, that is. After all, I didn't really need a tablet. My gaming rig PC (bought and paid for at great expense only two months previously) would more than accommodate my obsessive needs to play games and access the Internet for the next half-decade. So why do I feel the need to buy a tablet? The embarrassingly honest answer is: "Because everyone else has got one!". And not only everyone else! A lot of people I know don't even understand computers! But here I am getting e-mails with the subtext: "sent from my iPad", or somesuch! And, to boot, I am a devoted science fiction fan! I have lived with the concept of personal devices that enhances the knowledge base for years before this technology arrived. Everything from Jack Kirby's "Mother Box" in the comics to Charles Stross's "Singularity" in the hard Sci-Fi literature. Intolerable that I should do without when everyone else is playing with the new toys!
So, with consummate efficiency, it arrived. Ordered on Tuesday morning from Google Play, arriving Wednesday morning courtesy of TNT. Shakily breaking the seals, what do I find? One tablet. One micro-USB lead. One USB adapter. One plug. Two bits of paper: one legal warranty that no one reads; one "quick start" guide that comprises of two technical bits of advice (recharge the device and turn it on) and endless pages of Health & Safety instructions (don't use this near explosives, don't use this if you have a pacemaker, don't upset airline staff, don't pour acid over it, don't give it to kids, don't wipe your ass with it). All of it useful, I'm sure but none of it actually telling me how to use the damn thing!
So, you do what any chimpanzee does. You turn it on. Then, in the absence of the oh-so-familiar mouse and keyboard, you stab at the flat, glossy surface with your monkey fingers. And, because you believe yourself to be more evolved than said primate, you start running your greasy digits backwards and forwards over the screen in the same manner as you've seen the kids do (but without the easy, slick confidence of said teenagers, methinks). Accidentally tilting the screen, causing the gyroscope to do things that you absolutely KNOW a TV or a proper PC monitor doesn't do, you see a revolting film of skin grease and fingerprints that would give the average CSI operative an orgasm. Finally, after a few hours of making the pretty colours race backwards and forwards, and up and down, across the screen, you admit that you will NOT be the master of this particular device in a single day. With a sense of defeat you put the new toy to bed and, with the simplicity of the aforementioned 6-year-old, play with the cardboard box for a bit before returning to Skyrim on your beloved PC. Round 2 tomorrow.
So, with consummate efficiency, it arrived. Ordered on Tuesday morning from Google Play, arriving Wednesday morning courtesy of TNT. Shakily breaking the seals, what do I find? One tablet. One micro-USB lead. One USB adapter. One plug. Two bits of paper: one legal warranty that no one reads; one "quick start" guide that comprises of two technical bits of advice (recharge the device and turn it on) and endless pages of Health & Safety instructions (don't use this near explosives, don't use this if you have a pacemaker, don't upset airline staff, don't pour acid over it, don't give it to kids, don't wipe your ass with it). All of it useful, I'm sure but none of it actually telling me how to use the damn thing!
So, you do what any chimpanzee does. You turn it on. Then, in the absence of the oh-so-familiar mouse and keyboard, you stab at the flat, glossy surface with your monkey fingers. And, because you believe yourself to be more evolved than said primate, you start running your greasy digits backwards and forwards over the screen in the same manner as you've seen the kids do (but without the easy, slick confidence of said teenagers, methinks). Accidentally tilting the screen, causing the gyroscope to do things that you absolutely KNOW a TV or a proper PC monitor doesn't do, you see a revolting film of skin grease and fingerprints that would give the average CSI operative an orgasm. Finally, after a few hours of making the pretty colours race backwards and forwards, and up and down, across the screen, you admit that you will NOT be the master of this particular device in a single day. With a sense of defeat you put the new toy to bed and, with the simplicity of the aforementioned 6-year-old, play with the cardboard box for a bit before returning to Skyrim on your beloved PC. Round 2 tomorrow.
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